The role of personality traits and life stress in alcohol use disorder: Insights from NGF gene polymorphisms of Han Chinese population in Taiwan.

Objective: Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is a complex neuropsychiatric condition influenced by genetic and environmental factors. Nerve growth factor (NGF) plays a crucial role in neuronal neuroplasticity and chronic alcohol consumption may alter NGF levels in specific brain regions. The study investigates the associations between NGF gene polymorphisms, susceptibility to AUD, and specific stress and personality characteristics.

Nerve growth factor gene polymorphisms may be associated with heroin dependence in women but do not mediate specific personality traits.

Heroin dependence (HD) is a complex disease with a substantial genetic contribution and is associated with traits of impulsivity and specific personality traits. The neurotrophic factor nerve growth factor (NGF) may mediate the reward processes in HD. This study aims to investigate whether NGF gene polymorphisms are associated with the co-occurrence of HD and impulsivity/specific personality traits in HD patients.

Role and limitations of the geometric mean method regarding head rotation in salivary gland scintigraphy: a phantom study.

To investigate the possible influence of head rotation on the results of salivary gland scintigraphy, a phantom study was designed to simulate clinical salivary gland scintigraphy. The quantitative accuracy of regional activity counts was compared for two data acquisition methods involving head rotation: (i) an anterior planar projection-only (ANT) method and (ii) a geometric mean (GM) method using both the anterior and posterior planar projections. The roles and limitations of the GM and ANT methods when used at different head rotation angles were examined.

OPRD1 gene affects disease vulnerability and environmental stress in patients with heroin dependence in Han Chinese.

Exposure to stress not only increases the vulnerability to heroin dependence (HD) but also provokes relapse. The etiology of HD and the role of life stress remain unclear, but prior studies suggested that both genetic and environmental factors are important. Opioid related genes, including OPRM1, OPRD1, OPRK1, and POMC, are obvious candidates for HD.

Differential effect of the DRD3 genotype on inflammatory cytokine responses during abstinence in amphetamine-dependent women.

Amphetamine exposure impacts on innate and adaptive immunity and DRD3 may modulate the effect of amphetamine on the immune response. We assessed the immune-cytokine markers in 72 female patients with amphetamine dependence (AD) at baseline and after 4-week drug abstinence and in 51 healthy women. Multiplex magnetic bead assay was used to measure the plasma cytokine expression level simultaneously in all participants and DRD3 rs6280 polymorphism was genotyped in patients.

[Mechanisms of focal adhesion kinase in the proliferation of human pulmonary artery smooth cells under hypoxia].

Objective: To explore the mechanisms of focal adhesion kinase (FAK) in the proliferation of human pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells (HPASMCs) under hypoxia.

Methods: Cultured HPASMCs were passively transfected with FAK oligonucleotides (ODNS) and under normoxia or hypoxia condition. They were divided into four groups: normoxia without fibronectin (FN), normoxia with FN, hypoxia without FN, hypoxia with FN in vitro respectively.

Focal adhesion kinase antisense oligodeoxynucleotides inhibit human pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells proliferation and promote human pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells apoptosis.

Background: Pulmonary artery smooth muscle cell (PASMC) proliferation plays an important role in pulmonary vessel structural remodelling. At present, the mechanisms related to proliferation of PASMCs are not clear. Focal adhesion kinase (FAK) is a widely expressed nonreceptor protein tyrosine kinase.